About the Coalition

Over the past two decades, countless reports have called on universities and research institutions to collect and make easily available information on training outcomes for their life science students and postdoctoral researchers. These calls emerge from a widespread concern that trainees do not have information on the full range of research careers in and out of academia, that institutions are not providing trainees with the training or skills for this diversity of careers, and that this is leading to hyper-competition for tenure-track positions and prolonged periods in postdoctoral research without opportunity for advancement that is harmful to the incoming generation of scientists, and the science they will produce. Our institutions – nine research universities and a major cancer institute – announced in December 2017 that we were joining together to commit to a number of steps to improve transparency and trainee outcomes in the life sciences.

The December 15, 2017 article in Science announcing the Coalition can be found here.

Coalition members commit to collecting and publishing data using common standards on:

Admissions and matriculation data of PhD students.

Median time-to-degree and completion data for PhD programs.

Demographics of PhD students and postdoctoral scholars by gender, underrepresented minority status, and citizenship status.

Median time in postdoctoral status at the institution.

Career outcomes for PhD and postdoctoral alumni, classified by job sector and career type

The Coalition agrees to work broadly to provide meaningful career exploration and placement support for a broad array of potential career paths, improve mentorship at both the doctoral and postdoctoral stages, and increase and improve recruitment and retention aimed at diversifying the life sciences workforce.

Milestones

The first milestone for publication of data was on February 1, 2018, at which time Coalition institutions published the first two categories of data. You can find that data here.

The next milestone for the publication of data is in July 2018.

The Coalition is funded by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation and an anonymous donor.